She's back
by araihchiara
Summary: Bonnie hesitated, then she said in a whisper: "It's a boy." "What are you asking me, Bonnie? What do you want?", hissed Annalise struggling to control her anger. "You want me to adopt your baby? You want us to live happily ever after? " Set one year after 3x15
1. Chapter 1

"Hi".

Annalise got all choked up when she saw Bonnie in front of her. When she opened the door, the last person on Earth she'd expected to see was her former assistant.

Annalise envisioned that very moment many times. She imagined seeing her accidentally on a train, or a ship, or a dull sidewalk. She believed Bonnie would be clever enough to leave town. Maybe she would see her on a warm winter night in Lisbon, or Rome, or Madrid. Maybe she would meet her in Oregon, walking on a white sandy beach.

She imagined turning her back to her, and by doing that brutally hurting her, so that Bonnie would believe she had been totally forgotten. Just a shadow of her past, or maybe not even that.

She pictured that one day Bonnie would have come back to her, knelt at her feet, cried hopelessly, begged Annalise to forgive her, to take her back.

She imagined confronting Bonnie in court, taking her down and leaving her in the courtroom licking her wounds, not even dignifying her with a single look.

She pictured herself… maybe even killing her, because the pain she'd put her through by disappearing all those months was just too much to handle.

Annalise had suffered enough in her life. She knew that she could never list everything that had happened to her, because no one would ever believe her. It would just be ridiculous, one person can not attract so many misfortunes. Probably people would have struggled to stifle an awkward little laugh.

She had only one anchor, all those years. Not Sam and his affairs, not Eve and her priorities, not Frank and his selfishness.

Bonnie.

She knew Bonnie would do anything for her, that she would stay by her side forever, despite everything, through everything, devoted, loyal. Perhaps one day Annalise would get tired of her or decide that it was too much. She would have granted her assistant a second life, a second chance. But Bonnie was never gonna accept anything like that. She would come back every day, begging Annalise to hire her back, arguing that firing her had been a terrible mistake, showing her how much they needed each other. She would come back every day. Until the end of her days.

Except Bonnie, her Bonnie, was gone. Practically overnight, without a note, a letter, anything. Gone forever.

And now she was looking at her, looking her straight in the eye and couldn't understand that she was there, actually there, before her, and couldn't believe that their meeting was that simple, that common: Bonnie knocking at the door, Annalise opening it and seeing her.

"Hi".

Just one word.

Bonnie wasn't crying, she didn't have her eyes filled with tears or a broken, distraught, sorry gaze. She was looking at her, just looking, purely, simply. She was looking at her with a far-away stare. She was looking at her.

Bonnie was wearing a long coat, which ended just above her knees. Her face seemed more relaxed, the cheekbones less gaunt. But it was her gaze that kept attracting Annalise like a magnet, she couldn't stop staring at her, looking at her straight in the eye. Annalise had never seen so much self-confidence in the woman standing next to her. Did she want to make her believe that their meeting was inconsequential? Maybe it was just a mask, perhaps for the first-time Bonnie was able to wear a facade even before Annalise. Her eyes were now opaque, not transparent as they had always been. They were so opaque that Annalise could no longer see what was behind them.

After a long moment of silence, Bonnie finally asked:

"Can I come in?"


	2. Chapter 2

Can I come in?"

Annalise, still unable to speak, nodded vaguely and shifted a little to let her in.

Bonnie walked down the hall and stood in front of the stairs, looking around.

"Everything is so different."

"Yes. You're right. "

Bonnie winced slightly hearing Annalise's voice after such a long time, then started talking again with a forced casual voice, looking at the taupe walls of the corridor.

"I'm glad you chose to give up on the wallpaper."

"I haven't decided yet. It was a Sam thing, but with no wallpaper the house looks bigger."

"Seems like a benefit to me."

Annalise shrugged and gave Bonnie an icy glare.

* * *

What Annalise would have wanted to tell her was that she never felt so alone. After Wes's death, the Keating 4 vanished. Frank never had the courage to show up again. Eve got married. For months Bonnie was her only touchstone, her only constant, her only friend. She was the one who reminded her to go to AA meetings, she was the one who took care of the insurance for the practice, she was the one who chose the contractor to repair the fire damage and hired him. For the first few months, she welcomed her boss under her roof and took care of her as no one had ever done. Sometimes Annalise could barely get herself out of the bed and it was still Bonnie who called her softly, Bonnie who encouraged her to get up, Bonnie who brought her a coffee and a croissant. She made sure Annalise would eat, would sleep through the night, wouldn't miss the important appointments.

They spent hours, days, months together, inside the rebuilt skeleton of that dreadfully burnt house. Every single time Annalise felt like she was in the belly of a whale: she forgot the concept of space, time, was devoured by memories and consumed by guilt. And each time, Bonnie brought her back to the present, forcing her to imagine her new life.

* * *

"How about painting the walls in taupe?" She asked a warm day in July. The house was almost ready. There were only a few missing details like the wall color and the new furniture, very little of which had been saved.

Annalise dismissed her with a smirk. "I don't know, Bonnie. There should be some wallpaper in storage, but not enough for the entire house."

The assistant looked at her with blank eyes and said, "Okay. We can take it to some store and ask if they have more."

They never got the chance.

The next day, Bonnie was gone.

* * *

"Wanna see the rest of the house?"

Annalise escorted Bonnie all through the place. It almost seemed they were following a script: they entered a room, stared for a few moments, and made casual remarks assessing the efficiency of the house remodeler and the beauty of the furniture. They were both playing defensively, just waiting for the right moment to strike.

When they reached the bedroom, Annalise caught Bonnie staring at a beautiful blue butterfly print. A few months back Bonnie bought it at a flea market and gave it to her as a goodbye present.

* * *

"Wake up Annalise. I have a gift for you."

Annalise barely opened her eyes. She was dreaming about running in the green, she was just fifteen and beautiful. When she saw her assistant sitting on the bed, Annalise furrowed her brow. Where's Sam? And then, like every morning, she remembered everything smelling the floral scent of Bonnie's sheets, so different from her own.

"A gift?"

Bonnie was thrilled. She put her palm on Annalise's eyelids and gently told her to count to three and open her eyes.

"It's for your new home. A symbol of rebirth, you know?"

Bonnie kissed her softly on the forehead. Annalise moved, probably trying to reach her mouth, but Bonnie shifted and showed her the blue butterfly.

When Annalise found it in a box, Bonnie was long time gone and it was clear that she wasn't coming back. In a fit of rage, Annalise threw it against the wall and walked away, unable to handle all the memories. The next day a worker found it, had the broken glass replaced and hung it, believing he would gain that fierce woman's favor. When she saw the print on the wall, she was no longer able to touch it.

* * *

Annalise felt that Bonnie dropped her defenses for the first time. It was time to attack.

"How far along are you?"

"What?"

"You're skinny. Even with the coat, I can see it. How far?"

Bonnie blushed, she hoped she could stay in fully control a little longer. But now Annalise had made a move, and she felt like she was suddenly losing the game.

She breathed deeply, then answered.

"Six months."


	3. Chapter 3

"Six months."

Annalise looked Bonnie straight in the eye. She had already suspected the reason why Bonnie had put on weight and was walking with a newfound confidence and an inscrutable face. To actually hear it confirmed, however, was a different story. Annalise started feeling dizzy and perceived that the air around her was getting thicker and darker. She had to sit on the bed to process the news. Bonnie was pregnant.

"Six months, huh? That's six months since I last saw you."

"27 weeks", said Bonnie with no trace of irony in her voice.

Annalise felt in her mouth the taste of a familiar pain, the same ache she experienced for the last time when Bonnie, crying, told her that Lila was pregnant. Everyone seemed capable of conceiving and carrying a child to full term, even teenagers and some white trash. Everyone but her.

"Did you already know, Bonnie? That's why you ran away?"

"I didn't run away. I just did what had to be done."

Bonnie delivered this sentence talking as if it was about someone else. Keeping her gaze on Annalise, she undid one by one her coat buttons, slowly.

Annalise was mesmerized by Bonnie gestures. Seeing her assistant showing off all that confidence wasn't familiar at all. Over time, Annalise learned to recognize her thousand faces and her thousand souls. She knew when Bonnie needed to laugh and when she needed to cry, when Annalise had to be tough with her and when she had to encourage her, when Bonnie would have needed a kiss and when she craved to be punished for her inadequacy. What she never expected was that Bonnie, one day, would decide to get away from her.

"You didn't see this coming, did you?" said Bonnie reading Annalise thoughts and putting her coat on the chair next to the mirror.

Annalise looked up. "No, Bonnie, I didn't."

Bonnie sat beside her. "You think I wouldn't be able to raise a child?"

"You said it, not me."

Bonnie casually began to caress her belly, echoing an action that Annalise, and every other pregnant woman in the world, had made thousands of times. Annalise looked away, feeling the bitter taste in her mouth become stronger - almost unbearably so.

"Do I know the father?"

"No", Bonnie sighed.

"Do you? Know him?"

Bonnie shook her head. "Not really."

Annalise found a bottle of vodka on the nightstand. She took a sip, absently wiped the corner of her mouth with her thumb and spontaneously offered the bottle to Bonnie. She raised an eyebrow and looked at Annalise with an unreadable expression.

"Of course you can't," stated Annalise whilst pulling away her hand.

"I never said that."

Bonnie grabbed the bottle and had a sip before her boss could reply.

Annalise couldn't find peace. Was Bonnie back to stay? To confuse her? To hurt her? What did she want from her?

"Let me see if I understand. Last summer you got yourself knocked up by some guy you met in a bar? That's how it happened, Bonnie? "

"At the courthouse. That's where we met." Bonnie was still holding the bottle of vodka and she was gently running her finger over its neck.

"Oh, great. Another stunning love story born in the courtroom," Annalise said, her lips turning up into a snarky smile.

"I've never seen him again."

"Is this even the truth? Are you lying to me? I don't know if I trust you anymore, should I?"

"You're mad because I left," whispered Bonnie, a hint of desperation in her voice.

Annalise snapped up, unable to hold back her anger.

"Of course I'm mad, Bonnie. I waited for you every day to come back. Every time my phone rang, I thought it was you. I was about to call the police the first day, I called Nate… He did some research and surprise! You weren't kidnapped, or killed, or God knows what, you were just moving across the State like it was perfectly normal to disappear like that."

Bonnie's eyes now expressed immense pain, and Annalise couldn't understand whether that pain belonged to Bonnie, or whether it was her own sorrow she could see reflected in the other woman's face. Annalise sensed that her assistant wanted to get up, reach her, maybe even hug her but she recoiled crossing her arms. Bonnie remained seated and whispered:

"I'm here. I came back to you."

Annalise sneered at her. "You sound like a broken record. Look what it happened last time you told me that."

"This time it will be different, Annalise. You'll get to decide everything, and I'll do whatever it pleases you. You want me to go and never come back? I'll never bother you again. You want me to stay here, to work with you until the end of my days, all day, all night, without having a life, a lover, a friend, anything? I'll do that. All I ask you is a favor. Please, do me a favor."

Annalise didn't know how to feel: used, humiliated, or euphoric for the life-and-death power Bonnie was granting her. But she'd make that decision later.

Annalise gave Bonnie an icy stare, then answered:

"Just tell me."


	4. Chapter 4

"Just tell me."

Bonnie shifted her gaze on the blue butterfly print, Annalise's stare was hurting her too much. If someone entered the room that very instant, they would face the weirdest scene: after six months Bonnie was back, was pregnant, sitting on Annalise's bed and holding a bottle of vodka. Annalise stood in front of her, with her arms crossed and her body stiff.

Bonnie took a breath so to speak, but the words died in her throat.

"Just tell me," repeated Annalise in a much sweeter tone while lifting her assistant's chin toward her so that Bonnie could look into her eyes. A tear rolled down from Bonnie's cheek.

"I didn't want to leave, Annalise."

"I know."

"I wanted to... when I found out I was pregnant I just - I just wanted to protect it. I knew it would never be born if I stayed in this house."

Annalise widened her eyes and Bonnie realized how horrible her words sounded.

"I didn't want to say… I'm not saying this house is cursed. Or that you are. I'm -" Bonnie sighed, she didn't want to hurt Annalise but apparently this, harming her boss, was the only thing on Earth she was really good at.

"Go on," Annalise prompted, and it felt like a dare, like she was daring Bonnie to keep going, to talk herself into a hole.

"Try to understand me. There were too many things to do: the house, the practice… so many thoughts, obligations, responsibilities. It was just too much. And after what happened last time I got pregnant I - I wanted to have this baby, Annalise."

"I wouldn't ever have asked you to terminate, you know that."

"I know, it's just... you would have never accepted it."

"That's not true," said Annalise clenching her fists so tightly that her knuckles went white.

"After I saw the pregnancy test, I dreamt every night about the very moment I'd tell you. In my dreams you hugged me, helped me decorating the room, we went shopping and argued about baby clothes."

Bonnie smiled for the first time since she entered Annalise's house. Only a bit of a smile, a blink, a heartbeat. Annalise felt some warmth spreading around her body, melting the ice built up in all those months of deep solitude. But that was just a moment. Bonnie's eyes became opaque marbles again, and the ice went back devouring everything was in the room.

"The dreams didn't end like that, something else always happened. Once, you took the baby by the hand and you buried me alive in the middle of the desert. I called you, I yelled at you, I cried and panicked but... you pretended not to hear me and left me in there. In another dream, you told me that I had poisoned the baby with my own milk, that I was the most irresponsible and dangerous mother." Bonnie drank another sip of vodka. "I couldn't stay, Annalise."

The two women stayed silent for a few minutes. Bonnie brought again the bottle to her lips, stopped, exhaled and put it on the floor. Annalise couldn't think of anything, her thoughts were racing and rushing and chasing each other as if she had suddenly begun to think in another language. A language she didn't know.

The minutes filled the space between them, thick and heavy, until Bonnie could barely stand it.

"What's the favor?", Annalise asked, finally.

Bonnie hesitated, then she said in a whisper: "It's a boy."

"What are you asking me, Bonnie? What do you want?", hissed Annalise struggling to control her anger. "You want me to adopt your baby? You want us to live happily ever after? "

"I want you to help me get rid of it!"

Annalise flopped down on the chair and gave Bonnie a cold, hard, piercing look. Bonnie's coat hit the ground, but no one bothered picking it up.

"You are a monster. I always stood up for you, Bonnie, I've always believed seeing something else in you beyond that goddamn armor but now I know I was wrong. You have no heart, no soul, and no brains if you think I will help you."

"I just need the name of a doctor. That's all I'm asking. You'll certainly know someone who...". Bonnie started crying quietly swallowing her last words. "I thought I could make it, Annalise. I was convinced I'd do the best for it."

Annalise shuddered, hearing Bonnie talking about her baby using still that word: "it".

"Maybe I wouldn't keep it, maybe I would have given it up for adoption, but I was sure I'd make it to full term. I believed it was a girl, you know? I talked to her, I reassured her…". Bonnie unwittingly touched her belly and softened her voice. "I didn't want to know the sex. I just wanted to give birth to her, to see her, to hold her. But during the last ultrasound, the doctor let it slip it was a male. He said: 'Go give the good news to your husband, he's gonna be very happy'."

Annalise cut her off: "You can give him up for adoption. You don't have to - "

"I can't bring a boy into this world. I just can't."

"Not every man is like your father, Bonnie. Think about that."

Bonnie let out a sad, bitter, weird laugh. "Name a man, just one, that entered this house the last few years and didn't commit some hideous crime."

"We all are terrible people. Don't pretend not to be one," hissed Annalise rising to her feet.

"There are worse things than murder. You know that, Annalise. I can't raise a boy. I tried… I - I just can't."

As she spoke, Bonnie twisted her hands, fretting her fingers anxiously. She couldn't keep her gaze on Annalise, knowing that she was about to curse her out, to tell her truths that would hurt.

That's not what happened. Annalise walked over to Bonnie, knelt at her feet and rested her cheek on Bonnie's lap, as if she was worshiping some ancient fertility Goddess. Bonnie's stomach dropped and she tensed involuntarily - she'd been prepared for everything, but this? She'd always taken everything; she'd let Annalise insult her, abuse her, belittle her, despise her... but this was so new, so unexpected, that she just froze.

Annalise looked up to meet Bonnie's eyes and said in a soft voice: "I'll tell you again. And again. Every time you'll need it. Not every man is like your father," a small pause "or my uncle."

"I'm not ready," murmured Bonnie.

Annalise sat on the bed beside Bonnie, caught her face in her hands and said softly: "Nobody ever is."

Bonnie tried to say something, but was cut short by Annalise's thumb against her lips. "You're back. I'll help you, we'll raise him together. We'll make it. Perhaps he'll become a doctor, or an attorney. Maybe a murderer. But he will never hurt a woman. Ever. I promise you, Bonnie."


End file.
